1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an automated analyzer.
2. Description of Related Art
Automated analyzers are known which accept biological samples (such as serum, blood cells, urine, and cerebrospinal fluid) as specimens, cause the specimens to react with reagents, and perform analysis of various components such as sugars, cholesterols, proteins, and enzymes.
In such an automated analyzer, specimens may need to be pretreated depending on measurement items. For example, before a specimen is reacted with a reagent, the specimen is diluted or a pretreatment solution is added to the specimen.
For example, JP-A-H10-62435 discloses an automated biochemical analyzer which injects aliquots of biological samples from sample containers set on a sample turntable into dilution containers set on a dilution turntable by means of sample-diluting pipettes (probes), injects a diluting fluid into the dilution containers to dilute the aliquots of biological sample to a given proportion, dispenses aliquots of the diluted biological samples from the dilution containers into reaction containers set on a reaction turntable by means of sampling pipettes, add dispense reagents from reagent disks, adds the reagents to the reaction containers by reagent pipettes, and analyzes the biological samples in terms of plural items.
The automated analyzer described in this patent document has the dilution turntable on which the dilution containers for diluting samples are set and the reaction turntable on which the reaction containers for reacting diluted biological samples with reagents are set. That is, dilution (pretreatment) of samples and reactions of the diluted biological samples with the reagents are performed on the different turntables.
In an automated analyzer in which pretreatment of samples and reactions of the samples with reagents are performed on different turntables, the instrument tends to be large in size and complicated.
In view of this problem, an automated analyzer has been developed in which pretreatment of samples and reactions of the samples with reagents are conducted on the same turntable. For example, JP-A-2010-217057 discloses an automated analyzer having a sample aliquot dispensing mechanism including aliquot dispensing arms, a horizontal arm, and a vertical rail. Reactions of specimens with reagents and pretreatment of the specimens using pretreatment solutions are carried out on a common disk. The dispensing mechanism has free access to a container in any position on the turntable and injects an aliquot of sample and an aliquot of pretreated sample.
The automated analyzer described in this patent document, however, needs to be equipped with a mechanism for moving the aliquot dispensing mechanism over the common disk. This may complicate the instrument.
In recent years, there has been a demand for an automated analyzer which is neither large in size nor complicated but provides improved processing capabilities. However, as described previously, in the automated analyzers described in the above noted patent documents, the instruments may be large in size or complicated.